The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) has published the results of the monitoring of bathing water quality around Scotland in 2008.

A total of seven sites were served with a ‘red card’ because they received more than one sample exceeding the mandatory EU standards for water quality. In spite of the poor weather, with an increased number of official sites monitored (up from 61 to 80) this actually represents an improvement in overall performance from last year with 91% of sites and 98% of all samples being good or excellent. Encouragingly, the 20 newly designated bathing water sites in Scotland this year have all passed water quality standards, with 10 good quality and 10 excellent despite of the wet weather.

Michael Russell, the Scottish Minister for Environment ,said:

“I am disappointed to see that some of our bathing waters have not met the required European standard. Unfortunately, for the second summer in a row, Scotland has been cursed with some horrific weather, not least heavy rain across the country. The bad weather has had a deeply detrimental effect on the quality of our bathing water results which is very unfortunate.

“I am however pleased to see that the twenty new bathing waters I designated earlier this year have come up to scratch which reflects well on those responsible for their upkeep.

“While there are factors beyond our control, we must not lose sight of the need for Scotland’s bathing waters to be of the highest possible quality and the Scottish Government will continue to work with SEPA, Scottish Water and others to ensure this is the case.

“2006 was a record year for bathing water quality in Scotland with 100% compliance. I am determined that we will achieve those standards as the norm even if our weather conditions are making it difficult at the moment”.

Another area that has worked well during the summer has been SEPA’s electronic information signs at 10 busy beaches around Scotland. For the first time this year, the signs displayed additional messages, alternating between displaying daily water quality status and reminders to keep beaches tidy. The extension of the forecast system on the website for Eyemouth was also a success and an electronic beach sign will now be installed there for next year.

The poor results registered this year by SEPA were generally recorded after heavy rainfall. Heavy rainfall can cause drainage overflows and produce high levels of polluted water run off from land upstream, which washes into the sea and reduces bathing water quality. However, rainfall cannot be blamed for all the results. Some of the poor samples were caused by agricultural derived pollution, while some were caused by sewage. Where sewage was the cause, SEPA took swift enforcement action and Scottish Water took prompt corrective measures.

SEPA bathing water expert Calum McPhail said:

“The weather has been mostly responsible for short pollution events, which resulted in poor samples or ‘yellow card’ scenarios.  However, we should recognise that nearly half of the bathing waters still managed to achieve the highest guideline standard, despite the episodes of wet weather this summer. This is testimony to the joint efforts of the Scottish Government, Scottish Water, the farming community and SEPA working together to lessen the impact on nearby water systems and provide the public with good information.

“However, there is clearly more to do and we must all intensify our efforts to maintain progress and learn to cope with summer intense rainfall events if these trends continue, particularly as we are required to achieve tighter standards and new beach management duties in just four years time”.